


Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart

by Sircadia (Beaufort)



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, M/M, Pining, Season/Series 05, Slow Burn, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-10-23
Updated: 2014-11-30
Packaged: 2018-02-22 08:38:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2501474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beaufort/pseuds/Sircadia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The road to Washington D.C. isn't a leisure stroll, with the North Star as their guiding compass. Like all journeys, each mile warrants its own demand of tribute and sacrifice, in matters of both the body and heart. And for Rick, Daryl is just as unattainable as he needs him to be.</p><p>Follows S05. Updated weekly, after every new episode. <br/>EPISODE UPDATE: CROSSED</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. No Sanctuary [5.01]

**Author's Note:**

> Will loosely follow Season 5 as it’s coming out. Upfront warning though, this means that there's no pre-planned plot, and will therefore lack pace, and closure. Focuses mainly on interactions between Rick and Daryl, and will presume you've seen the pertaining episode (recently). Please be aware. Thank you and enjoy!

It’s not that Rick has time to think about it. An elbow jutted outwards, shoulders harshly sloped, and ears open for the whisper of a siege- he doesn’t have that casual leisure. Not when his muscles ache with vestigial violence, still thrumming dangerously, hot and molten beneath skin and scalp.

Not when they’ve been tossed out on their asses again by the dying world like a handful of chipped dice- landing haphazardly in the crooks and crannies of the stinking forest around them. Rick doesn’t have a goddamn second to himself, not to think, and not to linger. That’s how it should be. 

But when his eyes have shuddered into the restless minutes before sleep, he recalls the pause of his gait, and the hesitance of an outsider looking in.

` ✢`

He’d always thought the closest that curling mop of dark tresses got to anyone was a shoulder away. His left, and right. On the rare occasion, near enough for Rick to take a glance, and wonder, for the umpteenth time if it was uncomfortably warm for Daryl. His hair. Sweeping heat on the back of his nape, with a brow of sweat. 

Daryl drew people to him, like an oil lamp for ashen moths, but everyone knew, loud and clear, that he didn’t like to be touched. Rick won’t say it, but there’s always been a hint of pride in the way he stands, Daryl at his side, with the knowledge that he’s come closer than most. 

A shoulder away.

That was the distance Daryl was comfortable with, any closer, and the wind would change, the man’s lips curled into a subtle warning with bared teeth. 

It seems, not for the first time, that Rick assumed wrong. And probably  _had_ assumed wrong for a long damn time. 

Rick didn’t give those thoughts the time to curl up in his throat like foul tendrils of rot. He’d simply smiled, cheeks tight with exhaustion, and lashes lowered to give Daryl and Carol as much privacy as could be afforded with everyone piling into the clearing.

He had let out a breath then. A breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. Letting it fall into Carol’s shoulder as he’d embraced her tight with affection, gratitude, and relief. A heavy exhale, but quiet like the final resounding note of a musical tie.

They’ll be good for each other, he’d thought.

` ✢`

Rick pulls the ragged slip of jacket tighter around himself, falling asleep with strung nerves, and the smug knowing stare of Shane on the back of his neck. 

No sanctuary. Not even in fantasy or sleep.


	2. Strangers [5.02]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My apologies, this took a while. I really wasn't satisfied with what I wrote, so it took a couple of days to straighten this out. Thank you all so much for reading, and leaving kudos!

Back in their days at the prison, Rick had once fallen asleep on the rickety stool in Hershel's cell, head pillowed against the concrete by a swaddle of old clothes. He'd woken up with his spine aching, a tingling sensation traveling along his back.

The chill had brought on a low hum of headache, and a shiver to his arms, in spite of the blanket and towel layered over the length of his sleep slack body. 

"I didn't want to wake you, Rick. You sleep so little as it is."

Swallowing around a sore throat, Rick had offered him a tired smile, and a quick word of thanks. He wanted to see Judith first thing in the morning, guilty, after handing her off as abruptly as he did yesterday evening. Carol hadn't minded, an easy smile on her lips, but Hershel had paused, noticing the falter in his steps, and uneasy breathing. 

Exhaustion, Rick had excused for himself. 

Before he left the cell, Hershel had slowly turned to him with an unreadable expression, his years showing in the wrinkles and folds of aged papery skin. In the barren morning light, there was a certain mystique to his silvery beard, and watery blue eyes that see well and beyond what the rest of them could.

Just an old man, a bag of ancient bones with a lecturing tongue. A goddamn stubborn farmer with enough booze to water his crops with it. Rick's heard all of these things at some point or another, in good humor and otherwise. But no one doubts the goodness, and love in that heart, the spirit that thrives even when the world bends and gnaws at his stubborn old bones. 

Rick chose not to see the heartfelt apology in those paternal eyes; he couldn't bear it.  

"Take good care of yourself, Rick."

 ✢

Rick lies awake, eyesight drifting quietly through the underbrush of the forest.

There are more and more instances of his heart spasming beneath his sternum- a brief few minutes where his chest feels tight, and much too snug. Rick waits out each second, mouth open, a quiet muffled gasp, lungs starved for air.

The pain always threads through his ribs, spreading from shoulders to jaw, gaining momentum and pressure like an invisible serpent. 

It's not that he's ignorant or cocky; it's simply that there's nothing he can do about it. The dead and living don't stop for him to rest.

Sleepless nights are now common enough that he's come to grudgingly accept the pocket of ache beneath his eyes, the bone sore and delicate. He doesn't have any right to complain though, given the swollen purple of Daryl's eye- now dark and sunken like a crater patch during a lunar eclipse.

He hears Daryl approaching, yards from his actual arrival, light footed steps that barely make an imprint on the soil beneath. It's the sound of Daryl on guard, but in the presence of familiar shapes in the darkness.

Rick inhales deeply, and pushes himself into a sitting position, the muscles in his arm still tingling from previous exertion, carrying the lingering reminder of Terminus. Daryl crouches next to him, two feet away, crossbow held deceptively at leisure between the spread of his knees. 

"Should get some rest, ya look like crap."

Daryl's tone is gruff and sincere, but it sounds more like an opener than anything else. Which means there are more pressing concerns he's about to voice. 

"Felt somethin' round camp earlier. Too dark to see no one, but it don't seem like they're singular."

When their eyes meet, Rick sees the unspoken warning in them, and it brings a familiar chill to his lungs.

Rick stiffens, previous threads of thought discarded, shoulders squaring on instinct. He reflexively thinks of the loose ends they'd left after escaping- mentally scaling the distance with their speed of travel, and the likelihood of being followed.  

Daryl's face is darkly shadowed in the obscure lighting, the hiss of leaves above them sibilant and eerie. If Rick were to reach out, he might just find himself curling fingers into swaying tree branches and noose knots.

"I'll head out tomorrow, early in the mornin', 'fore anyone screws with the tracks", Daryl mutters, the agreement to keep their speculation between them silently communicated. 

"Was anyone else there with you?" Rick asks, voice quiet to avoid rousing anyone. 

It's Daryl's body expression that answers the question- a subtle raising of the jaw, and quick flicker of the eye. Never challenging, but Rick's learned that a variation of the sentiment comes across sometimes in small subtle gestures.

Daryl is Rick's one man check-and-balance, not an extra opinion, but a necessary one. By turns, loud and quiet, brash to fill their weary silences, and perceptive of the smallest changes around them. Rick doesn't want any doubt between them. 

 _Carol's here to stay_ , he wants to assure, firm with no wiggle room for hesitance, _but I don't regret my decision to send her away either_. 

Taking in the way Daryl is looking at him, he wants to add,  _It's the now that's everything._

He doesn't end up voicing either thoughts, but he's sure Daryl understands regardless- the way his eyes travel the length of Rick's weathered face, and comes to a personal conclusion. Shoulders losing the tense edge, right knee regaining its jittery habit of movement. 

The matter closes itself like a book, punctuated when Daryl squints at a overgrown beetle, and kicks it away from where Rick's knees are resting. 

Purposely scuffing him in the process.

"Go the fuck to sleep, Grimes. It ain't yer watch."

 ✢

 _We surrender_ , Daryl had said, hands held up in a casual mockery of the gesture, the denim around his elbows torn open at the sides.

They slide into rhythm, easily in sync when Daryl gives him non sequiturs, and darting looks, the squirrels hung over his shoulders periodically knocking into Rick's hips and thighs. On the off beat, like his heart spasms. 

Rick can only hope that it won't ever come to that again. Whatever comes their way, be it Gabriel's secret, or the presence of hunters, surrender isn't an option, and neither is going at it alone. 

 _We aren't splitting up_ , Glenn tells Abraham.


	3. Four Walls and a Roof [5.03]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one just refused to write itself, scratching and yowling the entire way. The next one might come a bit late too, seeing as I'm being crowded into a corner by schoolwork. I'll try my best though. As always, thank you so much for reading! <3

  
Rick can't pinpoint when exactly Daryl became a staple in his life, the unremarkable weave of memories lost between wave crests of Lori's cold disappointment and Shane's vicious grins.

By the time he'd consciously noticed, Daryl was already there, hips cocked, and walking defensively as if just waiting for someone to call him out on still being there. The match to Rick's pyre.

Rick's seen the map work of scars on his back, some rigged deep like railroad tracks and others mottled and thick. All are pages of history written on his skin, broken in and sewn together until it all looked like an old patchwork quilt.

There's an unparalleled presence to the man, from the set of his jaw, to the hard lines of his crossbow. An ability to survive the toughest runs with only a noisy spat of blood, and narrowing of the eyes. Half delirious from tire, injury, and heat, yet still snappish and disgruntled like a feral alley cat.

_That all ya can do, ya dumb fucks? Bit of dickin' aroun' and that's it?_

Rick can pinpoint all the times he's lost sight of Daryl though, each a swooping fall that knocks his teeth into the soft of his lip, incisors cutting in sharp and bloody. It's no easier to bear, even as he finds out Daryl and Carol's absence have nothing to do with Gareth and his rag tag band of leftovers. 

He's not beyond tearing into anyone that takes Daryl away from him, directly or otherwise. And for a brief moment that someone becomes Abraham, and in the apex of his snarling cold anger, he would've done anything.

The memory of the Claimers floats hazily in his mind- Carl's fear like a sharp blade of ice pushed into Rick's navel, and Joe's blood bubbling out of his throat.

✢

Glenn sits against the rough splintered wood of the pews, breathing in the aftermath. He doesn't think he'd be able to stand right now even if he wanted to, feet numb from sitting cross legged, Maggie's hair pooling into his lap and over the grime of his shoes.

Glenn brushes those strands away from the cloying dirt, eyes drifting back up the ceiling of the church afterwards. In the dim pallor of the night- morning, he amends halfheartedly- every scuttling sound rings louder, echoing like brass bells in the house of the Lord.

Bob's every labored breath fills the stagnant air around them, a rise and fall like a raspy hymn. Amplified over cooling blood, and hardening bodies, stamping loss into their hearts. Glenn is aware of every movement and heartbeat with a preternatural sensitivity, and it all grates in his ears like a too-long finger nail over cracked porcelain.

Maggie has drifted off into a fitful sleep, if it can even be called that, exhaustion and adrenaline coming together in a dance of sine curves. Her shoulders jerk periodically, as if from impact, the flat of bone digging into Glenn's thighs.

In his periphery is Rick, restless and prowling in the narrow walkway, the friction of his jacket and jeans in movement keeping them all painfully alert and tense.

Glenn thinks Rick doesn't stop because he can't- moving means his eyes are travelling, gaze bouncing off the broad of Abraham's shoulders, and Michonne's unseeing focus on the returned blade. Surveying the tremors of Gabriel's dark clothed back, and Tara's rustling unease.

Moving means Rick won't stare at the smear of Gareth's limbs, and feel absolutely nothing.

The coldness has left Rick's jawline and brittle blue eyes, disappearing incrementally as Bob slips away from them with each ticking hour. But what substitutes it isn't any better. Glenn's eyes follows his gait, back and forth, finding a detached comfort in the familiar motion, but even he can see and feel the edge of knifing desperation licking at Rick's heels.

The conflict of needing to stay, and wanting to run, chasing that cruel but solid packet of adrenaline and action, promise for promise, and kill for kill. The cut of Gareth's skin to burn away loss, and a good hard war scream that rattles the rib cage.

Rick moves, and keeps moving, to stop the weight of a world without Daryl again from pushing him to his knees.

✢

Glenn leaves, as he'd sworn to Abraham, Maggie at his side, and the brightness of the day an offense to all their silent goodbyes, and overwhelming loss.

It takes all the ruthless discipline in Glenn, and then some, to stay seated, to not let the waver in Maggie's gaze flame the riot in his muscles. An inevitable decision made in the evening now so guilty during the frank light of day.

Rick doesn't look at Glenn like he's pulling away when they need him and Maggie the most. There's no blame nor anger in Rick's open stance, the quiet stare and exhausted curve of his mouth saying everything between them, stretched over the days and months, impossible to express in simple neat words. Washington D.C. sits between them like a promise and curse, but a destination for reunion. 

When the bus pulls away, and the church falls from view, Maggie's hand curls around his, tight enough to hurt, because walking away from family never gets easier. 

Glenn knows this won't be the last he'll be seeing of Rick Grimes though. Not the last he'll be seeing any of them. Daryl, Beth, and Carol included.

✢

_The world needs Rick Grimes._

Rick holds the map close, letting the words wash over him, overlapping with the memory of Bob's hand beneath his, Judith heavy and asleep in his arms.

His apology of it all, burned away by their forgiveness.


	4. Consumed [5.06]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi there, my sincerest apologies for the weeks of delay. The episodes of late have been entirely devoid of Rick and Daryl, separately or together. Thank goodness for Consumed in breaking that particularly rough dry spell. I've yet to watch the latest episode tonight. Hopefully it has goodies in store? Thank you all for your kudos and comments; they've made me so very happy. Please enjoy. <3

The first time Ed kissed her was on the edge of a spread of twinkling lights, a small patch of bustling townsfolk enjoying the carnival that came through only once a year during the early weeks of August. The smell of hot grease had wafted through the air from a nearby hot dog stand, sticking around without a cool breeze to disperse it. His hand was against the nape of her neck, thick over warm fingers tangled in pale hair.

Carol remembers that evening with a kind of distant clarity that filtered in through the small irrelevant details- the dirt sediment beneath her borrowed heels rough and noisy, and her Sunday's best, a hanging blue dress that sat on her thin frame like an ill-fitting bathrobe.

She'd remembered the sticky sweat beneath her arms, and the self-conscious way she’d held her elbows to hide it from Ed's view. She recalls, much to the horror of her younger self, that Ed pulled on her elbows- a jerking movement when he wanted her to follow- and that had exposed the nervous sweat rings beneath her arms. Ed had took one look and laughed, this smug curl of the lip, and a dark flicker in his eyes that she'd mistaken for a backwoods charm that came with the unschooled Southern lilt, and thick low eyebrows.

Carol doesn't remember reciprocating, frozen in embarrassment with an anxious flush on her neck. But she did remember closing her eyes, and thinking perhaps first kisses were always like this- terrifying butterflies, and a coltish desire to run.

And then Ed had stepped away, thumbing at the cigarette tucked above his ear, carnival lights a golden hue behind him, little pinpoint fireflies converging together as one.

She should have ran.

 ✢

Carol stares through the dust and scratches of the windshield, scrutinizing the distant rear lights of the black car she and Daryl are tailing. The cross is visible like a white gull stepping through a wet marshland at night, hard to look away from, and terrifying for its sacred shape.  

It feels like they're moving much too fast, and much too slow, all at the same time, each press of the accelerator sending her heart jackrabbiting in her chest.

Carol looks at Daryl with a quick side cut of the eyes, and sees lips pressed into a thin line, knuckles pressed raw and firm around the steering wheel. The length of his hair hides most of the bruising, but from between the messy strands, she can see skin mottled with ugly greying purple.

_M’ alright, so back the fuck off, y’all, damn greasy fingers all over m’ face._

How do you do it, start over, she wonders. How far back do you rewind the timeline, before pressing GO again, or maybe starting over means creating a separate set of frames altogether.

She still wants to leave, unsure of where or who she belongs to, if God is still her keeper, the way he wasn't Sophia's, or Ed's, or all the souls that came afterwards. The ones that she took with bullet, knife, and fire.  

Carol’s prayers have fallen loose and dry on her lips, the words no longer filled with meaning or faith.

She’s a puppet cut loose, a foreign body in her own skin, uncomfortable and bobbing along in a stream without direction. It isn’t until Daryl tells her to get in the car, _they’ve got Beth_ , foot heavy on the accelerator, eyes a severe sliver, that Carol gets jolted back into existence.

With the twin orbs of glowing light, dangerous and within reach in front of them, and Beth's lingering warmth in Daryl's fierce words, she stays.

As much as she’d wanted to, she can't imagine running away now.

 ✢ 

Daryl lies on the bottom bunk, one knee pulled up, hands laced across his navel. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees the thin crescent of a shoulder peeking out, and an unruly head of silver hair against the meager evening light.

He toys with a fraying strand around the bottom of his cut off shirt, considering the rough etchings on the metal board above his head.

He can't read whatever the hell chicken scratch's up there, but it looks like the efforts of a child's shaky slim wristed carving. He doesn't want to reach up to feel them out, just in case Carol sees. Though deep inside, he knows it's because he's afraid that they're Sophia's.

Everything about this place is too much, from the old paperback left innocently on the table, to the pink blanket that smells of dust and cloying baby powder- a scent he's become strangely fond of even though it tickles his throat the wrong way tonight.

Marylene Cloitre, Lisa R. Cohen, Karestan C. Koenen. Daryl wonders callously about _their_ interrupted life, and what big words they gotta say about the steaming batshit crazy around here. Psychotherapy this, he wants to holler, mean and derisive.

Though a smaller part of him knows the book will find its way into his bag soon enough. He’s trying, it’s gotta mean somethin’.

 ✢ 

The 10 by 10 is still a cell of darkness, with but a single window pane letting in a peak of morning light, when Daryl's gently shaken awake. He pulls back from the touch, squinting into the dim room, until a scowl pulls at his mouth.

_Hell, why didn't y' wake me up for m' shift?_

Carol only shrugs, repeats that it's fine, with a wispy nonchalant voice, refusing to elaborate further. Daryl blinks again, more alert when she simply leaves, drifting through the room as ghostly as her tattered grey shirt. A sly curl of cigarette smoke.

_Goddamnit, Carol?_

The receding footsteps spike his concern like receiving the blunt mouth of an electrical taser. A wave of sudden anxiety pulls at his crimped muscles.

Daryl scrambles for his crossbow -somehow sitting beside his bed- and shoulder bag, kicking his boots upright, and slipping them on as he's already running.

_Carol, what's goin' on?_

His voice bounces eerily against the walls, as if mimicking the point of fluorescence from his dimming flashlight.

He normally isn't this clumsy, but somehow while rounding a corner he runs his shoulder into the wall, and the impact jars his teeth into sinking through his lip. Against his expectations, the coppery taste of blood doesn't flood his mouth; his tongue feels gummy and dry instead. 

When Daryl finally catches up, Carol’s already at the entrance of the complex, and he's more out of breath than he should be. His ribs feel like they’re caving in on his lungs, and he can hardly get a single inhale in.

The fuck, he’s never been a runner like Rick before, with those damn long legs of his, but he shouldn’t be this bad in shape. He can't be getting too old for this shit, least until another few years.

It also unnerves him that his thoughts are spinning chaotically like a gyroscope in his head, and he can’t seem to focus on the important ones.

It might have been minutes, or hours, or even days before Carol turns to him, a slow vibrant smile painted across her lips, and it's warm and unreal; there's so much love in her next words that Daryl instinctively flinches away, feeling them whip across his cheeks like a belting from decades ago.

_Sophia's here._

_Carl and Judith too. They're all here, Daryl, say hello._

In the end it's Carl that he sees. That distinctive teenage slouch, with an extra untidy gate. He has that Sheriff’s hat perched on the side of his head, but even it has lost shape, crumpled in on itself and thick with stains. It suddenly dawns on Daryl what this is, slow and sluggish, the rising awareness slithering across his sleep frozen limbs.

 _Where's yer dad_ , he still asks, irritated at himself the instant the words have left his mouth, all hollowed out, with the syllables sounding oblong and stupid.

Carl continues on, body sloping to the side, as if his body weight is too much for his bones. The street stretches out, familiar and foreign, simultaneously a neighborhood and the husk of an abandoned city of crumbling skyscrapers. 

Daryl tries again, but the question falls to the wind, and all he hears is a cruel rattling laugh in response, and words so faint he knows that he’s waking up.

_Funny, that's the last thing my dad said too. Where's Daryl?_

And then a nearby fire hydrant explodes, punching the dead flesh out from Carl's rotting ribs. A jet of cold water that wakes Daryl with a violent jerk.

 ✢

 _You knew_ , the room whispers, when he nudges Carol away from the window. _You were the only damn one that knew there were people out there, besides Rick, and you left. You fucker._

Daryl covers his eyes with the broad of his arm, exhaling instead of snarling out the expletive he wants to. He hopes to high hell, whoever those motherfuckers around camp were, they'd run off, or were too damn pussy to attack the Church. They have Michonne and Abraham after all, Glenn and Maggie, and the rest of them a damn right force to be reckon with even on a shit day. 

Though, the sinking feeling in his stomach tells him otherwise- that whatever he felt that night was confirmed by the subzero realization in Rick's eyes, and tight lipped frown following afterwards. Daryl's skin wraps tight around his ribs like wet leather, and a persistent anxious tapping finds its way into his fingertips along the edge of the window sill. 

Go. Don't wait up.

Anywhere that’s safe for the time being, fuckin’ D.C. or otherwise, he thinks, recalling the crooked slip of a smile on Rick's lips after seeing Judith's babbling delight in the honey melting glow. Father, son, and daughter surrounded by tentative laughter and bone weary grins. The way Rick’s eyes carefully slipped past his, and how he’d looked away, kicking out his boots to find a different point of interest. The way they missed each other on purpose.

We'll find y'all soon enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Frolick with me on Tumblr @ Sircadia. <3


	5. Crossed [5.07]

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the wonderful comments and kudos! This chapter was difficult to write but worth the agony since things are finally heading in the right direction. Enjoy!

Michonne walks side by side with Daryl, close enough that their shoulders bump companionably. The church is just a few paces away, but now that he's here, the hours and miles weigh on the heels of his boots. The band of the crossbow is tight against his chest and Daryl finds himself tugging uselessly at it.

Noah walks in front of them, shepherded along like an inmate. The sparse moonlight falls against his neck and shoulders like a dusting of silver. It reminds Daryl, oddly, of the pale glimmer of Beth's hair in the dark.

Michonne doesn't ask him anything, the questions that must plague her, and he returns the favor. Her long limbs are tensely held, and the reappearance of that sword, tucked against the length of her arm, draws his eyes. The guilty relief of finding them still here dissipates like a drop of ink in water.

The air is thick with the taste of loss- the faint scent of rot and blood drifting even through the thick wooden doors of the church. Noah looks at them expectantly, but Michonne only presses her palm flat across the wooden carvings.

Daryl watches her fingers curl over an edge, and then with a decisive hand, give one low pound like the fall of a gavel.

 ✢

For all that Michonne watched Rick scuff the wood stone-smooth with his pacing, the man doesn't move a single inch when they enter into his view. Even when the others have lowered their makeshift weapons, roused from their sleep by Father Gabriel’s panic, Rick doesn’t withdraw his.

Michonne stares into his eyes, steady and unyielding until finally the gun arm falls to his side. Accompanied by a shaky breath and cracking of the neck.

Rick gives Daryl a tired up down sweep of the eye, something antsy and agitated deflating out of his chest. The colt goes back in his belt holster, and there's a minute of silence, disturbed only by Michonne's breathing. It sounds so loud in this place, the four walls and a roof that Maggie had proclaimed it.

Tyreese lingers in her periphery, Sasha not too far away, expression hardened into something hurting and raw. It’s almost like everyone’s waiting for Rick to make the call, to say something in the least. The clear absence of Carol weighted, and delicate. 

Michonne almost speaks herself, but then Rick clears his throat and walks up to them, eyes sharp and darting. He approaches her, and then Daryl, almost hesitant, like a toddler reaching out for something that could break. He never does come in contact with Daryl though. Never does verify through touch. 

Instead, he allows a small somber smile on his lips, lashes low and shielding. His words are quiet and sincere, like they'd been warmed under his chest for so many autumns and winters.

"It's good to have you back, Daryl."

Michonne senses the hunter shuffle his feet self-consciously beside her, returning Rick's sentiment with a subdued nod, and lingering glance that is so common between the two of them.  

Eventually though, Daryl's eyes fall on the red stained wood, the inevitable gravity pull towards death these days, and Rick steadies himself with a clenched jaw for the words to come.

There’s loss, and hope, and more loss. Michonne can feel the ebb and flow of it through the group, stark and naked in a way it hadn’t been when they each took their own share and swallowed it down in the dark. Verbalizing it is something else entirely. It almost reminds of her court, where words are always too cold and refined to even touch upon scars and tragedy.

When she bids them goodbye with Carl later, a stray thought curls in the snug cavern of her skull. It's only later, after the night has cloaked the church in its infinite velvet black that Michonne snags that thought with a discrete hand.

Without anyone in her near vicinity, she finds the space and time to whisper a quiet conversation to her baby boy. She misses the weight of his slight body against the crook of her arms like a phantom limb. It's a hollow longing that even the laughter and gurgling of Judith cannot replace. Peanut would've turned four today.

She'd meant what she said to Rick after that supply run. 

She didn't miss her sword. It's everything else that she misses. 

 ✢

“Two. On me.”

Rick runs, boots pounding quietly on the asphalt, taking care to avoid the napalmed walker remains scattered left and right. He pauses at the corner of what appears to be another trailer with its metal sides spilling out like toy stuffing. Flattening his back against it, he motions Sasha and Tyreese to emerge from one side, and Daryl-

Is nowhere to be found.

Rick’s lips narrow, scanning the direction they came from. Nothing.

Tyreese opens his mouth to say something, but Rick shakes his head, a hand motioning forward. They split up.

Rick rounds each of the corners, gun poised and knees steady. The sudden crunch of something has his eyes zeroing in on the carcass of a flipped van. Pressing as low as he can, he walks slowly, watching another pair of boots move in tandem on the other side. Rick counts the seconds until he sees the last of a heel, and that’s when he darts forth.  

Rick has half a second of advantage and he uses it to drop low and sweep a heavy kick at the man’s knees. The shot that fires go wide, a foot to the left of Rick’s head, whizzing past harmlessly. It’s only a split second before the cop rights himself, ducking below another hit.  

The second shot gets much closer, the bullet grazing Rick’s shoulder, taking with it a sliver of his worn out T-shirt. This time though, Rick shoulders aside the outstretched arm, following up with an underhand strike with the length of his colt. The metal catches the man across the jaw with a loud ominous crunch.

He holds the man at gunpoint until Tyreese and Sasha make their way over, the other cop in tow. They’re not supplied in zip ties, but belts work just fine.

Then he’s off and running.

Rick arrives when Daryl is purple in the face, knuckles deep in the eye sockets of a walker, smashing the skull against the head of his assailant. It deters the man enough that he lets go of Daryl’s neck, but there’s another source of danger a few inches away. Something oozing and melted with snapping jaws.

Rick clips the walker in the mouth, a shot that goes straight through its head. The colt is warm in his hand when he lines it up with the man’s forehead. The action is so familiar and repetitive of what had occurred only minutes ago, but this time he knows he’ll shoot, calm and steady without a shred of doubt. 

His only hesitance is whether he wants it to end that easily.

Rick.

“ _Rick_.” Throaty and low, the cracking voice of someone working out words through rings of bruises. 

Rick spares Daryl a quick glance, before securing his eyes back on the man who’s still frozen in place, though obnoxiously unafraid. 

Daryl rises from his knees, arms soot dark, fingers still dripping of filth. He circles them widely, footsteps slow and calming, a trick he’d picked up from Rick in the beginning of all of this. How to move, and how to talk down someone standing on the very edge, just waiting for a single trigger. He just didn’t realize he’d be using it on Rick himself one day.

The ice cold stare that meets his is terrifying even from this distance. It's a kick to Daryl's stomach, being on the end of certain death. Not a shred of heat; no messy chaotic emotions, no desperation. Just brittle murder, more dangerous than Rick was with Shane, Tomas, Joe, and all the ones in between.

Daryl can only imagine what happened to Gareth. He recalls tracing the blood sprays on the pews as he'd passed, taking note of all the different angles it came from. Tyreese still has trouble looking Rick in the eye, meek as he'd suggested an alternative plan. Eyes lowering when he was told that it might work, but that wasn't enough. 

“Three’s better than two,” he offers, voice purposely light with a hint of played up humor. The words seem to only tickle Rick at first, but Daryl sees the moment it truly reaches him. And then there’s the few seconds that it takes for him to grudgingly step down. 

The bald cop grins smugly at them, and Daryl has half a mind to kick him unconscious anyway. Goddamn fucker for getting them here in the first place.

Daryl feels Rick’s stare on him as he ties the cop’s wrists together with more force than necessary.

 ✢

Licari, Rick learns, is the name of that asshole.

He has doubts about this plan, and it seems to grow shakier by the moment. It’s terrifying, Rick thinks, how he didn’t follow through with his sweep of Terminus when it fell, and how he’s now relying on the word of another cop. 

The consequences of every wrong call are _terrifying_.

✢

Daryl walks ahead of him, pacing through the warehouse, agitated as well. Sasha’s tending to Lamson, and Tyreese is keeping an eye on Shepherd, Noah positioned as their lookout. Rick's eyes follow Daryl’s footsteps while squeezing at the well of blood on his shoulder where the bullet clipped the surface of his skin.

It’s not until Daryl is suddenly so much closer that Rick realizes he hadn’t been just following the other man's footsteps with his eyes. He'd been quite literally just walking, until he's pressing his fists into Daryl's shirt, irrationally seething.

The hunter has a split second to draw out a bolt before he’s shoved against one of the concrete pillars. His hand comes up over his back with the arrow, quick and smooth, the tip pressed against his attacker’s jugular. When recognition filters through his eyes, it's with a confused frown pulling at his mouth. 

“What the hell.”

Rick refuses to look him in the eye.

He removes his hands from Daryl’s shirt, but doesn’t step back. It’s a strange position to be in, too close for comfort, and leaning in too much, without support. Finally, he rests his forehead against the concrete near Daryl’s ear, feeling an immediate cold on his skin that soothes the skulking anger.

Daryl squints his eyes, hands having awkwardly fallen to his sides. Rick is close enough that he can count each heartbeat hammering into his own chest, and the same must be true in reverse as well. A subtle flush colors his ears.

Daryl tries his best to stay as still as possible, shallowing out his breathes so that neither of them move too much with each rise and fall. It takes a while for Rick's temper to dissipate, difficult for how many other fraying emotions are tangled with the initial outrage. 

When there's nothing but silence between them, Daryl’s gaze floats quietly over the warehouse, feeling a sudden dizzying exhaustion in his bones as well. From the church to the hospital, his past few days have been spent zigzagging between the two with hardly any rest, and it's a wonder he's still standing. 

His shoulders lose a bit of its rigidity as he acclimates to the weary weight against him. 

✢

There’s almost nothing to say. The bulk of their communications have always transpired through glances, nods, and hand gestures, the rest left to broken bits of conversation here and there. Less now that they no longer have the stability and leisure of their prison days.

Eventually though, Daryl finds his words, though they come out stilted at first, his audience much too warm and close. 

“Almost let Noah die out there. He was ‘bout three feet away, and I was gonna let that walker eat ‘im. Walk right off like he ain’t shit that deserves to live.”

Rick stiffens, but doesn’t draw his head back, knowing it would put him too close to Daryl’s face otherwise. He closes his eyes and listens intently, feeling the hunter's chest move with each word. 

“Li’l shit pushed a walker right in Carol’s face, an’ I thought, fuck it, ain’t the saying ‘what comes aroun’ goes aroun’? I wasn’t gonna save him none, and that. That would’ve been on me.”

Daryl pauses, struggling with his words. Fingers graze over Rick’s elbow, barely there, ghosting along. It sends an irrational thrill through his body, so he withdraws them shortly. 

“M’ not sayin’. Fuck. M’ not sayin’ you ain’t right to want to kill that man, but don’t lose yerself again, Rick. You ain't that person.” 

Rick closes his eyes, inhaling deeply. He brings up a hand to squeeze Daryl’s arm, feeling the strung tension of muscle beneath. It’s far from what he wants to respond with, but it’s all that he can bring himself to do at the moment. The cold of the concrete is giving him a dull headache, but he is thankful for the chill as well.

When Daryl nudges at him after a few minutes, Rick goes along with the movement and pulls back. His eyes automatically flicker to the ring of red bruising on Daryl’s neck, and he winces in sympathy. Come tomorrow morning, it’ll turn a dark purple. 

“Looks real bad.”

Daryl snorts, looking away, “Don’t feel too great either, Grimes.”

Rick’s hand reaches out before he realizes it, fingertips grazing the edge of mottled red. Curiously, experimentally. The angry flesh is sticky from sweat, and rough from where grime clings to it. The pads of his fingers are humid, leaving little wet sensations on Daryl’s neck. 

Rick traces the bruises lightly, but Daryl flinches anyway, eyes darting at him, wary and confused.

They’re both barely breathing.

Rick’s not quite sure what he’s doing, and he looks a little helplessly at Daryl for guidance. _Just give me a signal_ , he thinks, recalling the hunter’s words from so many months before. It’s a horrible juxtaposition of contexts, yet Rick can’t think of any other way to express this, even internally.

But Daryl looks just as scared as he feels, and maybe this isn’t what he’d thought was happening between them. He’s made bad calls before; this could be one of them.  

Whatever could have been said or done goes unsaid and undone though, because Sasha’s found unconscious, and Lamson gone. Rick pulls away, hand sliding back against the barrel of his colt, the metal a substituting cold against his skin. The relief on Daryl’s face is both strangely painful and thankfully sobering.  

Don’t thrust your illusions on someone else.


End file.
